Dale Potter holds his father's WWI dog tags after they were discovered on a French battlefield (by KWCH Eyewitness News reporter Jim Grawe / January 12, 2012) |
After 94 years, Infantryman Kent Potter’s World War I dog tag has returned home to Chase County, Kansas.
Potter was a member of Unit 139, of the 134th Infantry Division, Company M, U. S. Army. He served in France as a mule cart driver hauling supplies in France. Potter family lore tells a tale of the soldier loosing the tag during a mustard gas attack when he put his gas mask on his mule. Potter suffered from emphysema for the rest of his life.
It is not known exactly how Pvt. Potter's dog tag was lost in France, but he did survive the war, and returned to Kansas to marry and raise a family.
The military ID was discovered recently in Liverdun Lorraine, France by two Frenchmen, Michael Jean Toussaint and Claude Fonderflick who use metal detectors to search for artifacts on WWI battlefields in France.
They usually put the items they find for sale on e-Bay but the two were determined to return five dog tags that belonged to American soldies they discovered in the course of their work.
One of the dog tags belonged Pvt. Potter. An American woman helped the two men research Potter and was able to contact the Potter family through the Chase County Historical Society Museum.
On Thursday, January 12, 2012, the dog tag was returned to Potter's son, Dale Potter of El Dorado, Kansas, at a ceremony at the Chase County Historical Museum.
